THEY ARE COMING, the multi-racials, the non-heterosexuals, and British-born actress, model and star of HBO drama 'True Blood', Jessica Clark is just one of this bold new wave. By Ben Arogundade. [May.1.2016]

JESSICA CLARK DEMANDS attention. Not only for her skills as an actress and model, or for her lean 5ft 11inch frame, but also for the fact that she is an openly lesbian woman of colour. Not since Asian-American beauty Jenny Shimizu burst on the scene in the 1990s has there been such a fuss about a gay female celebrity.

JESSICA CLARK BIOClark is from a multi-ethnic background. She was born in London on April 21, 1985 to parents of Indian and Nigerian heritage, although she also possesses English and Irish ancestry. The 31-year-old actress's parents split when she was a child, after which she was raised in a liberal household in Hackney, East London, by her single mother.

Her big break came at the age of 16 after she won £5,000 in a national modelling competition. Before she knew it she was working the runways of Milan and New York, initially during the summer break from her studies as an undergraduate law student at the London School Of Economics. But as modelling took off she decided to give it total focus, and so she dropped out and moved to New York, where she ended up fronting a number of ad campaigns brands such as Adidas and Alexander McQueen.

JESSICA CLARK MEETS LACEY STONEClark first came to public attention in July 2004 after appearing nude in the Usher music video for his hit single, “Burn”. Soon afterwards she met fitness trainer Lacey Stone at a New York gym. After a 16-month engagement the couple were married on February 2010 on the island of Las Caletas, off the coast of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico (where same sex marriages are legal).

JESSICA CLARK AS 'TRUE BLOOD'S' LILITH Sidestepping the Bollywood tradition reserved for actresses of Indian heritage, Clark made her acting debut in 2011 in a low budget lesbian short film, Sara, directed by Stan Kowtna. Her breakthrough acting role happened in 2012 when she was cast as vampire goddess Lilith in season five of the hit HBO television series True Blood, in which she made a dramatic entrance by rising naked out of a pool of blood. Later that year she received a call from the editors at Vogue India, who proceeded to feature the model-turned-actress on the cover of their March 2012 edition, including 12 pages inside.

Throughout her upward trajectory, Clark, now based in Los Angeles, has fully embraced the reality of her sexuality and non-white ethnicity. “I am multi-racial, I am gay, and there's not much I can do about those things, nor would I want to if I could,” she told The Advocate. “So to sit there and worry, it's not a constructive thing.” In fact, Clark and Lacey Stone became spokespersons for their loud-and-proud lesbianism, co-hosting their own weekly online video blog, Lesbian Love, which discussed various issues in contemporary gay relationships. But their partnership was shortlived, and the couple divorced in December 2012.

MULTI-ETHNIC, OUT AND PROUD: British-born model and actress Jessica Clark stars as vampire goddess Lilith in HBO vampire drama 'True Blood'. The movie star has attracted much attention for her multi-ethnicity and open lesbianism. In 2010 she married fitness trainer Lacey Stone, but the couple divorced two years later.